Gore Film on Environment Nominated for Two Oscars

Former Vice President Al Gore said he is “thrilled” that his documentary film on the perils of global warming, “An Inconvenient Truth,” was honored with two Oscar nominations.

The movie received an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary Picture. A song from the movie, “I Need to Wake Up” by singer Melissa Etheridge, was nominated for best original song.

“The film … has brought awareness of the climate crisis to people in the United States and all over the world,” Gore said in an e-mail statement to the Associated Press. “I am so grateful to the entire team and pleased that the Academy has recognized their work. This film proves that movies really can make a difference.”

Nominations for the 79th Academy Awards were announced Tuesday. The Oscars will be presented Feb. 25 in Hollywood and televised on ABC.

In June EthicsDaily.com carried a two-part story based on an interview with Gore by Baptist Center for Ethics Executive Director Robert Parham. The former presidential candidate discussed global as a moral imperative for action.

“The moment you accept what the global scientific community is saying, and practically screaming it from the rooftops, the moment you accept it as true, you then as of that moment have a moral obligation to act on the basis of what you know to be true,” Gore said.

A Baptist, Gore urged clergy to engage the issue of global warming from a moral, rather than political, perspective.

“I would urge them first of all to learn about it, to go to see the movie, to get the book, to go the Web site, climatecrisis.net, learn about it,” he said before quoting John 8:32: “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.”

In an editorial Jan. 9, Parham challenged Baptists to take on global warming as a moral issue in 2007. While many fundamentalists deny the evidence for global warming, Parham said, a bigger problem for moderate Baptists is “moral sloth.”

“The nomination of ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ for two Oscars will give this must-see documentary an even higher profile, setting off another round of discussions about global warming,” Parham said Tuesday.

“Global warming is real,” Parham continued. “Caring for creation is a real moral imperative. The evidence demands a moral action within the American faith community. The environmental issue should no longer be considered a negotiable or secondary moral issue, as it has been for too long in Baptist and conservative evangelical circles.”

Also nominated in the same category as Gore’s film is “Jesus Camp,” a film about a Pentecostal youth camp profiled and reviewed by EthicsDaily.com.